What Is Love? - The Ode To Bonnie Bennett
by Lana Archer
Summary: While Bonnie is unconscious after trying to kill Damon, a familiar voice sets her on the right path and propels her into the future
**The Ode to Bonnie Bennett**

* * *

 _Here lies the one with the golden heart_

 _The Queen of her own Destruction_

 _Here lies the beloved, the betrayed_

 _Here lies the ultimate sacrifice_

 _Here lies with her, her love, her heart_

 _Together, may they find their peace_

* * *

"I was hoping it wouldn't come to this." The voice said. The last thing Bonnie really remembered before she'd opened her eyes to the sound of speaking was the pure determination she'd felt lifting the stake to end Damon's life.

The parts of her that she and Damon knew so well had risen up to his words, they _had_ ; they had wanted them to be enough. But that bitter, small part of her and the huntress and joined hands and decided that 'being loved like Elena loved you' didn't mean as much as Damon had wanted it to.

He hadn't loved Bonnie like Elena had when it was just them in the Prison World. He'd loved her the way only a bitter novice would, messily and triumphantly. He hadn't loved her like Elena would have when he left Elena in a time lapse to keep Bonnie safe and alive. No.

Then, then he'd loved her like only Damon Salvatore could love – almost on impulse – that breath of air between instinct and control – that's where he loved her the most. And really, wasn't that all that someone like him could ever come down to? When it mattered? How is it that when it really mattered, Bonnie was all that mattered?

Sixty years? Damon could justify that, he could fend off the odds for that long, or so he'd thought. But how could he justify flirting with Bonnie's immortality simply because he couldn't fathom nor stomach a life of his, a world of his, without her in it? "Are you even listening?"

Bonnie was drowning in realisation, in feeling. In love. She was loved. She must be loved. Nothing else would explain every breath she'd taken despite all the odds against her.

Something had forged the fires of the sun into love and left it in her hands. Something. _Someone_. Someone had gifted her with the curse Damon had unravelled in a vain attempt to get through to the woman he loved – his best friend. The woman who was now, in an unending stream of white iridescence that should have left her eyes searing, but only seemed to sharpen her focus.

"Who is that?" Bonnie heaved, her voice hoarse from all the yelling she'd done.

"What a shame." The voice tisked, morphing languidly into a familiar silhouette before the Huntress. "I know it's been some time, but I thought you'd at least remember my voice."

"…Grams?" Bonnie's voice lifted, almost imperceptibly at the possibility of seeing her long-lost grandmother again. "It can't be."

"Oh, but it is."

"Impossible." The older women tilted her head to the side.

"As impossible as you still being alive? Still being tethered to the physical realm?" The dead witch countered.

"I don't know how I'm even tangible, never mind breathing." Bonnie admitted, the murderous fog dispersing in her mind, bringing shreds of herself closer together, waiting for her grandmother's hands to weave them into something world holding on to. "In fact, when it comes to me, right now, I have no idea what or who I am. Beyond the supernatural, because of the supernatural."

"I know, baby." Something in the raspy lilt of the elder witch's sincerity tripped over Bonnie's heartbeat and before the Huntress knew what she was doing, she had Sheila in her arms.

"I need you back." Bonnie whispered, eyes prickling, "I haven't felt this close to myself in…in… _years_."

"Baby, you haven't been this lost in years." Bonnie frowned as she pulled back a little, still holding onto Sheila.

"What do you mean?"

"This spell, this failsafe where I can contact you is quite literally a last resort."

"So you're really here?" Bonnie's mouth quivered.

"I'm as real as I need to be baby girl, just as real as the danger you and Damon have put yourselves in, by loving one another."

"He loves me like Elena loves me." Bonnie countered instantly, "And while Elena's love has always ended up in trouble, I've been given enough time to understand that she never loved me that way, not really. So, when Damon said that he loved me the way she did, either way it wasn't enough. And that was pretty much the last thing I needed to hear, being seconds from killing him and all."

"This Huntress curse is the ultimate irony; I'll give Gia that." Sheila muttered as she pulled away fully and crossed her arms. "All your life you've found reason to put your heart above your calling when it comes to vampires and now it seems that the Universe has finally pulled out all the stops in taking your agency from you."

"Gia? The Universe and my agency? You're going to have to slow it down for me."

"Bonnie. Your instincts wanted you to hate vampires, to side with what you thought was good and true. But then you found out that it was your own kind that spawned these creatures, it was in essence, _your_ essence, _**our**_ essence that paved the way for all this chaos."

"I think you're referring to the decision making of a Mikaelson, which need I remind you, has never been stellar."

"Be that as it may, my point is that deviance is in our blood and it wanes in some and blooms in others. That's why certain witches will always go down in history; Esther Mikaelson, you, Bonnie Bennett. And others, like Lucy and your mother and myself, we're just carriers of the power that you wield. Am I making any sense?"

"You're trying to tell me that I'm different. Special." Bonnie couldn't help the sneer that pulled at her features. "That there's something about me that explains all of this."

"And there is." Sheila nodded. "It's your heart."

"If you asked anyone lately, you'd know that I no longer have one."

"You hesitated." Sheila said. "Remember, the three seconds? Like Damon said. Except, he came at it from the wrong angle and all you were doing in those three seconds was thinking about how much he loved Elena and you couldn't see the worth in that…so you raised the stake to kill him."

"That's not true, I know how much he loves her." Bonnie said, shocked. "I know, because that's all there is to him, remember?"

"Bonnie that couldn't be furthest from the truth." Sheila said calmly. "You can lie to them, to him, but you could never lie to me."

"So what then? What more is there to Damon Salvatore than Elena?" Bonnie pressed.

"There's you and Stefan." Sheila said easily. "There's how hard he fought to keep the both of you safe. There's the choices he's made since being trapped with you in a Prison World, there's the moral turmoil he's been inundated with since he's done his best to reassign his priorities. There's the ripple effect of realising just how much he cares about you."

"No, you're wrong." Bonnie shook her head adamantly.

"He desiccated himself to keep you safe." _Impossible_ , the Huntress thought, "He's loved you for some time now, and just now, when he tried to stay true to the person he was and the love he has for you, he failed, because it wasn't good enough."

"You're right," Bonnie hissed fervently, "It _wasn't_ good enough."

"After all the things this man has done for you; all the times he's chosen you despite this Petrova mess being wired into his DNA, he's chosen you. With everything it meant to him to be the one who finally got the girl, to put an end to the misery of his human life and the roaring emptiness it echoed into his immortality, instead of satiating that beast of a burden Bonnie, he, chose, _**you**_." Neither thought of what the consequences would be of not giving that part of him closer because Bonnie's angered flared and got the better of her.

" _I chose him too_!" Bonnie yelled before she could stop herself, "I chose him, over and over again I chose him when I knew that it was never in my best interest. I saved him and sent him home from the Prison World and ended up alone with no one to blame but the person, _me_ , that I could no longer live with. I chose _him_. My well-being never meant much to me, and I wanted it to then, but I still chose him." She felt the tears brimming. "And when I finally mattered to myself, when I finally had something to fight for, he got the chance to take that from me –"

"And he didn't –"

"He chose me. And then, I thought, maybe he did love me. Maybe you were right; but only about the man that saved me from Kai that night. He chose me. He loved me. I believe that. He said he'd never leave me. And that Damon never did. But the Damon who loves Elena? Who desiccated and left me alone for three years after resenting me as long as he did? The Damon who thinks that Elena is his only saving grace. The one who thinks that her name has any effect on the goodness of my heart – that Damon doesn't love me, in fact, that Damon doesn't even _know_ me."

"He's both of them Bonnie," Sheila said calmly, holding her granddaughter's hands, "He's your Damon and he's hers. He held onto Katherine's Damon for over 200 years, you're going to have to give him more than a few weeks to let go of Elena's Damon."

"What are you even saying?"

"You know what I'm saying. There's a Damon's Bonnie too. There was also an Elena's Bonnie, but she died the night you and Damon were sucked up into oblivion together, he was holding the hand of a ghost already because you'd decided you were going to die that night. You died when we'd said goodbye and I knew then, I knew the Bonnie they all knew would be gone forever – and I was right." Bonnie looked down at their hands now, knowing that it would be all too soon that her Grams would be sucked up into a void of nothingness again, that as much as the Supernatural world was capable of (something she was clear evidence of) that there were things even magic couldn't change – fate, destiny and death. "He was right about one thing though, you've been so many things, you've been so many types of brave, you've been on either end of the spectrum of strength. You **are** magic, Bonnie. You are its purest form, your body and soul can withstand anything you become and it's about time that you trust in that. And it's time that you realise that you are stronger than this murderous need that is festering inside of you. Yes, the curse is strong, but you survived the poison that was Expression, you returned to your human form after the Other Side imploded and you were its Anchor, all these impossibilities are possible for you because you are Gia's finest work of art. You are the one this world has been waiting for."

"You are Bonnie Bennett, you're _your own_ Bonnie Bennett, and you're also Damon's and your Caroline's and her daughter's and your Matt's. There are parts of your whole that will always belong to these people. They've shared parts of themselves with you as well and that is what love is. But above and beyond all this, you need to ensure that the culmination of who you are; all these people who own parts of you, your magic, all your memories, that you **own** that. You need to wield everything there is about you into a power of your very own, something impossible to quantify, and the only damn thing that will see you through this mess." Bonnie was nodding.

"I can do that." Bonnie said. "I want to do that." She corrected herself. "I just don't know if I can."

"No one knows if they are capable of doing something they've never done before," Sheila agreed, "And that's what gives the power to succeed, because it's challenges such as these that dredge up our innermost power."

"I wish I still had you." Bonnie said suddenly, "Throughout all of this, it's been you Grams, whenever I needed someone, it was you, even your memory, that's held me together and given me a fighting chance."

"I'm only the beacon baby," Sheila smiled, "I only shed light on what is already there." She cupped Bonnie's cheeks, "You're so resilient my love, boundless, and you leave me in awe of all that you have survived." Bonnie was really crying now. "Don't have this be the way it ends for women like us," Sheila said seriously, despite the tears in her own eyes. "Don't have this be the end of who we are, what we stood for and how violently we loved. Breathe life into our legacy and keep fighting," Bonnie nodded as she hiccupped on her tears, "Listen to your heart and follow it forward, trust in the adrenaline, feed on the thunder between your lungs and trust in what and who you are."

"I love you." Bonnie could feel the goodbye severing the grasp she had on the fading woman before her.

"I will always love you. Always." Sheila's voice echoed as she dispersed to nothingness. Bonnie dropped to her knees and slumped until she lay on her side, crying.

* * *

A while later she heard voices, and even as she tried to open her eyes, they wouldn't, leaving her in the dark. But she felt warmer, somehow. She could smell one by one, familiar flecks of everything around her. She could smell Damon. He was all that stood out.

"I'm not leaving her." His voice snarled.

"It's not safe for you," She heard Matt insist, "It's not safe for any of you. And the only reason I even give a shit, is because she does. That's the only thing keeping you alive right now, and that's only because she's asleep."

"Listen, Donovan," Bonnie could visualise how close he'd stepped into the blonde man's space, "My name is Damon Salvatore, not sure if you've paid much attention to me since we've met but I've never shied away from a death threat before and I won't start now, I've had the promise of forever, I've had the declarations of love and I'm still here, I'm still waiting to die. Let's chalk it up to some spiritual revelation or a belated epiphany of sorts. But when it comes down to it, when it comes down to Bonnie, I don't accept defeat, I don't accept her umpteenth death and no, I don't give a fuck if it's the last thing I do. All I ask," a squelch of clench fabric, probably Matt's coat in Damon's fist, "Is that you burn my ashes and tell Elena that I fucking _tried_."

"Damon –"

"All of you get the fuck out." The elder Salvatore yelled. Both he and Bonnie waited until it was quiet again. She felt his presence, an orb of tightly coiled cologne and frustration move around her. She felt cold fingers moved her hair to the frame of her face, uncovering her cheeks and the slope of her nose and the valleys of her eyes. She felt him lift her up and then the world lurched gently until it slowed to him depositing her onto his bed. She'd become familiar with its texture and smell. It smelled like both of them; it smelled like a war of skin scents, magic and bourbon.

"…Bonnie?" Her heart jilted at the sound of his voice. "I'm sorry." He said again, it seemed that that was all he'd been saying of late. "I'm sorry what I said wasn't enough. I'm sorry I thought I could use Elena to get you back. I'm sorry I thought loving you like she did, or at least saying that would be enough for you. I'm not Elena, neither are you, and our love is one of the only things I have left untouched by her or Katherine or the ensuing idiocy that revolves around all of that. Loving you took me by surprise too, believe me," His fingers smoothed down her cheek, "I didn't even know I had it in me. You're like evidence to hundreds of years of my brother telling me what I'm capable of. You're all the good things he sees in me, you're the catalyst to me becoming all of these things. And yet, despite me trying to do right by the both of you, trying to correlate what I can live with and what you want…I don't know. I guess there are certain things about me that will never change, like being selfish about what matters the most to me. But I only acted on that usual impulse because of how much you've grown to mean to me, everything you've done for me, how far we've come. I could never look at all the things we've survived and just stand by while you died. That's something about me that even being loved by you will never change. I can promise you that." He grew quiet.

"If you spend the rest of this endless life of yours hating me, then that's something I hope to live with. If you chase me to the ends of the Earth trying to kill me, then at least we'll finally be out of this shitty town and you'll get to see the world. If you want me dead Bonnie, someday, when I'm tired of you not being my best friend, and you being a violent Huntress gets old, then I say we both call it a day huh, what do you think? We'll finish that bottle of bourbon together, like we planned and I'll take your hands like you made me promise, and I'll give you my ring, like I promised, and we'll cease to exist and that will be that. But you will never live another day without knowing how much I love you, you will never live another day without knowing that I will do whatever it takes to make sure you are here and you are whole. I will go back to the ends of the Earth for you Bonnie, because that's what we do." Her fingers wriggled toward the sound of his voice and she heard his soft intake of breath.

"Damon?" She slurred somnolently. "…Thank you." A quick press of his lips to her forehead.

"Don't open your eyes." He whispered, an edge of desperation in his voice.

"I won't." She promised. "I won't for as long as I can, I want you safe."

"I know." He exhaled, she could tell he was sort of smiling.

"I love you." She felt the tear slide down her cheek. "I love you and I'm sorry that this could be how it ends."

"I love you too, Bon. And I'm sorry too. I'm so, so sorry this is happening to you."

"I guess this is what happens when a witch and a vampire care about each other, huh?" She smiled, turning her face to him, keeping her eyes closed, clinging to the fog that kept her sane. Remembering the voice of her grandmother, and the fresh swarm of Damon's words in her head.

"Chaos?" A breathy laugh. "And we do more than care about each other, remember?"

"I know. We love each other." A punch to her gut caused her to gasp, the pressure flooding her chest, leaving her breathless. Her eyes opened before she could stop them. Damon's panicking hands on her despite her alertness and what it meant for his safety.

"What happened?" He hissed, still doing an inventory of her body, looking for any sign of harm.

"I don't know," she looked down at her torso, where his hands slowed, and thy both listened to her heartbeat slow. "But my heart hurts." She was frowning when she looked up at him. The world slowed as they both held their breath. But as their eyes connected all she could feel was his hands on her, his bed beneath her and the sadness in his eyes as he waited for what was now deemed inevitable.

"Your heart?"

"My heart." Her small hand pressed into her sternum, trying to ease the pain. "I don't know, ow." He lifted her easily to him and sped downstairs. "Damon wait."

"No, while you're not killing me, we need to get you to a hospital."

"Damon, wait." She put her hands on his shoulders, knowing that the last time she'd done it she was trying to rip his head clean off of his shoulders. Damon Salvatore would never know how brave he was, she marvelled, he would never know how much he cared. "I don't want to kill you."

"…For now. Maybe it was what you were muttering about in your sleep?"

"What did I say?" She wondered as he put her on the couch and knelt before her. She took his phone from him and set it down, forcing his jaw upright to have him look her in the eye.

"Your usual mumbling," he said breezily, "Then something about your Grams and then, just my name a couple of times, so I knew you needed me, that's why I threw them all out, because I was kind of hoping that when you woke up, you'd settle for killing me."

"Something tells me that you might be the only vampire I don't want to kill." Bonnie said slowly, softly.

"That would be my doing." Both Damon and Bonnie jumped at the sound of Sheila's voice. "Hello Damon."

"Holy shit." He gaped.

"Consider this a farewell." Sheila said, "I'm using the lingering magic that keeps us tethered to do this one last thing for you, my sweet Bonnie girl."

"You made him exempt from the power of the curse?" Bonnie gasped.

"I made it possible for you to choose to save the one person you couldn't live without. Your heart did the rest." Sheila smiled that all-knowing smile of hers and moved forward. "Look after her, Damon." She warned him, cupping his cheek and turning to look at Bonnie. "Stay true to what I told you, baby. Stay true." Then, the elder witch disappeared and they sat, frozen in silence.

"What happens now?" Bonnie asked, looking over at him after some time.

"I don't know," Damon exhaled, moving to sit next to her to take her hand in his, "But at least you and I have the time to figure it all out."

"At least there's that." Bonnie agreed.

* * *

 _Years later_

"Now?" He asked and she nodded, making him smile, cracking the dried blood on his face. "You're sure?"

"Yes, Damon. I'm sure it's time." She was as battered and bruised as she, and they finally had something to die for, other than one another.

"We've had over a century together Bonnie, are you sure you don't want one more?"

"You're going to ask me that while we're stuck in a vervained basement cell warded with Siphons and Hunters?"

"I'm an opportunist, sue me."

"I'd settle for a kiss." Bonnie reasoned.

"I must insist on tongue."

"How could I refuse a dying man?" Bonnie muttered against his lips, with a soft laugh.

"I love you Bonnie Bennett."

"I love you Damon Salvatore."

* * *

Stefan stood staring two headstones, thinking of _Wuthering Heights_ for some reason as he stared at the names of his brother and the love of Damon's life. His cell phone rang and his heart sank at the name displayed.

"What." He quipped tersely.

"She's awake and asking for him."

"I changed my mind." Stefan decided then and there. "Tell her now."

"I should tell her he's dead?" The voice asked, teetering over to the incredulous.

"Yes, the sooner she hears it the better, she's from a whole other lifetime, a lifetime that has died with two of the most important people I've ever crossed paths with. My brother, and his wife, Bonnie Bennett. She should know as soon as possible so that I can spend less time stuck in a world I can no longer live in without being delusional."

"As you wish Stefan." He ended the call and looked up at the setting sun.

"Here lies the one with the golden heart

The Queen of her own Destruction

Here lies the beloved, the betrayed

Here lies the ultimate sacrifice

Here lies with her, her love, her heart

Together, may they find their peace" Stefan said slowly and passionately, quoting something long-lost. "Goodbye brother, Goodbye Bonnie. I will continue to guard the secret of yours." He looked down at the little girl gripping his hand as her heterochromic green-blue eyes went wide with realisation. "It's time to go home my love."

"Okay uncle Stefan."


End file.
